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22 February 2012

S.O.S. 2011 Tweeter of the Year

Last year, Owen Barder took the title of best on twitter just beating out myself and Alanna Shaikh. This time, I remain in my position of runner up and the well loved Chris Blattman ascends to take the title of best on twitter. With a rabid following of current and former students, the 'Blattman Bump' was again in full affect across many of the ABBAs categories. You will certainly see his name a few more times this week.

@calestous

4.7%

@viewfromthecave

22.9%

@cblatts

26.1%

@m_clem

13.9%

@africasacountry

7.9%

@scott_gilmore

4.2%

@owenbarder

10.8%

@nickkristof

9.5%

The nominees were entirely male this year and I take fault for not controlling against that when listing the finalists. I would argue the listed 8 are great resources on twitter, but are far from the only worth following in the space of aid and development.

A few people were bothered by the inclusion of Africa Is a Country in this listing. They are most certainly not 'aid bloggers' in the literal sense of the word. However, the blog touches on issues that are either directly or indirectly related to aid and development on a consistent basis. The twitter account goes a bit further as it does not simply tweet posts but shares news, information and commentary. The 'aid' in ABBAs is not to make this a narrow contest, rather it is to fit into a silly name. The discussion of culture is absolutely important to learning about aid and development. So, they are not aid bloggers, per say, but are an excellent resource that more should read and follow.

Finally, I expected Kristof to be a bit higher, but he did not promote his inclusion in the contest. I suspect that a single tweet asking for a vote would have easily sent him over the top. I actually consider that unfortunate because his followers would have been exposed to other bloggers, academics and writers.